Something Like Normal (Trish Doller)

Title: Something Like Normal

Author: Trish Doller

Publisher: Bloomsbury

Length: 217

Rating: 5/5

Travis is home from Florida, on leave from active duty as a U.S. Marine in Afghanistan. He’s not only haunted by nightmares of his best friend’s death, but his brother has stolen his girlfriend and his parents are having marital trouble. What a vacation. But then he runs into Harper, a girl he’s known since middle school, and things start to look up.

This book was awesome. Like read it in one night, cry a little, laugh a little, have the characters grow on you as if they’re real people kind of awesome.

Things I loved:

-A male narrator who seemed REAL (and not just YA girl fantasy real). Travis is kind of a jerk, but the more you learn about him, the more you understand why and love him anyway.

-I learned so much about the U.S. Marines from reading this book. Trish really did her research to get at the issues marines face coming home, but without making them out to be sob stories or overly-dramatized heroes.

-The romance. It was like a Nicholas Sparks novel, but shorter, snippier, and better. Harper’s pretty great, and I liked her spunk.

Let’s keep this review short, because I want to direct you to the coolest thing ever. I’m a huge fan of the blog Real Men Read YA, who read this book, and then challenged Trish Doller to a rap battle.  Check out the comments, because it’s Something Like Freaking Awesome.

*I read this book months ago, and I still love it this much. Also, keep your eyes out for Trish's new book, Where the Stars Still Shine, which I loved EVEN MORE than this one, coming out in September!